


Shelter

by Esteliel



Category: Rivers of London - Ben Aaronovitch
Genre: Angst, Book 4: Broken Homes, First Time, M/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-23
Updated: 2014-12-23
Packaged: 2018-03-03 02:28:56
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,086
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2834831
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Esteliel/pseuds/Esteliel
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The third night, he wakes and sees Peter in his doorway. There is just enough light to make out his expression; there is a tell-tale gleam in his eyes, and his face looks very young all of a sudden.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Shelter

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Deviant_Accumulation](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Deviant_Accumulation/gifts).



> Thank you so much to Ally for the beta help! :)

The first night, he finds Peter in the kitchen well past midnight, staring into a cup of untouched milk and honey that has long gone cold. They don't talk, but when he finds the bottle of scotch older than Peter, which Molly keeps hidden in what Nightingale assumes is the secret hope that one day the Prince of Wales will grace the Folly's formal dinners with a visit, they manage to finish half of it between them before Peter grows sleepy enough that he allows himself to be led back to his bedroom. Nightingale’s own hand is unsteady as he touches Peter's cheek for a moment before he says goodnight.

~

The second night, he finds Peter wandering the atrium, muttering under his breath and summoning a werelight every now and then with a furious desperation that makes Nightingale straighten with exasperation as well as fear.

He's lost one apprentice. He won't lose the other.

He is sharp with Peter when he calls him to reason and reminds him of the limitations Dr. Walid has so often drilled into him: the danger of thaumaturgical degradation, which he knows Peter is perfectly aware of. This time, he sees the anger bloom in Peter's eyes. He knows the despair and the betrayal that is hiding beneath. The wound left by Lesley's taser is festering within Peter's heart, and he is harsh enough that Peter storms off to his room at last with resentment bright in his eyes. This time, he sits alone in the kitchen and he isn't even surprised when, after a moment, Molly seems to appear out of nowhere to put down the half-full bottle of scotch in front of him.

~

The third night, he wakes and sees Peter in his doorway. There is just enough light to make out his expression; there is a tell-tale gleam in his eyes, and his face looks very young all of a sudden.

Nightingale remembers that look of shock and betrayal too well. His own losses happened a lifetime ago and the wounds have never truly healed. Now Peter, whom he wanted to protect from similar pain, has been swept up in something he would not even know existed if he hadn't walked over to talk to Peter that first night.

Peter doesn't talk when he comes to join him in his bed. For a moment, he wonders if that is all this is: a child seeking comfort after having woken from a nightmare. But he has never seen Peter as a child. Peter is a beautiful, bright adult – strong and smart and too curious for his own good. Even though he has never wanted an apprentice, from the moment they met and Peter looked him straight in the eye and told him that he was looking for a ghost, someone else had decided for him, and he knew that he could not let Peter go without teaching him all that he could be. What he wants – what he has always wanted – is to see Peter grow. To shelter him and teach him as much as he can, so that when the day comes that he can protect him no longer, Peter will have learned enough to defend himself against anything that might come his way.

But he cannot shelter him from grief and betrayal. This is a lesson he had not wanted Peter to learn. It is a lesson he himself has never learned, and something within him that had been thawed by Peter and Lesley's presence here in the Folly is aching now in a way it hasn't in decades.

He sits up as Peter slowly comes closer. For a moment he wonders if it is a dream. It seems like a dream: Peter is wearing only his pyjama bottoms; his chest is smooth; and even in the gloom, Nightingale can make out the way muscles move beneath the skin. Peter is no athlete, but he's seen him enough when they spar to know that with or without clothes, Peter has a youthful handsomeness that makes people's heads turn. He has told himself quite sternly that it does not do to think such thoughts about one's own apprentice – but those doubts scatter here in his dark room, when Peter slowly comes closer and then crawls into bed with him. 

The warmth of Peter’s skin tells him that this is no dream, and he half expects tears instead. He tells himself that all Peter wants is the comfort of not being alone, the reassurance that he will not leave and betray him as Lesley seems to have done. And yet, when Peter pulls him close, there is no hesitation in his touch.

He tells himself it's not a good idea. Then Peter kisses him, and all he can think is that certainly this is safer than Peter unleashing his frustration with magic, and then he cannot think at all, can only gasp against Peter's lips when a warm hand is pushed beneath his shirt, slides upwards and then around him to pull him close.

They don't talk. There's despair in Peter's touch, and he isn't certain how to reassure him. He doesn't know what to say, because there's nothing that can heal this wound. 

He knows that he should say no. The problem is, his body doesn't want to. It has been a long time for him – and never for Peter, he thinks, never with another man, if he has read him right. But this is not the time for a heart-to-heart when Peter hurts so much, and all he can give him is the reassurance of this.

They don't talk. At one point he tears himself away from Peter's mouth and Peter's eager hands, panting for air. He cannot think beyond that overwhelming need for Peter, and he nearly stumbles on his way into his bathroom. Peter asks no questions when he returns with lube and condoms. 

It's desperate. Peter's hands are a little too rough as they clutch at his hips, but it's good to be able to focus on where Peter’s fingers dig into his skin. Peter is hot within him, and Nightingale bites his lip and still can't contain his moans at the stretch and the burn. He wonders what Peter is thinking, wonders whether this will change everything, whether he'll lose Peter, too – the thought is unbearable, and yet, he cannot stop wanting. Not when Peter's gasps and the slick, hard thrusts within him are all that keep him from falling into the darkness of his own grief. 

He holds himself up with one hand and strokes himself in time to the rough rhythm of Peter’s hips driving into him. He feels Peter's skin against his back. Peter is damp with sweat, and he can feel him shudder as his breath comes in little gasps. The room is gloomy and full of shadows, and when he closes his eyes, there is nothing but the heat and the burn of Peter's cock impaling him with youthful vigour and all the anger and grief and helpless need to clutch at the one person that is still there.

It fills him with fire. Each hard thrust stirs that tight knot lodged deep in his chest, fans the heat until he feels that he can contain it no longer. He clutches at the headboard. There's a desperate sound – his own voice, he realises moments later, making a hoarse noise with every slide of Peter's cock inside him. The knot in his chest expands; he cannot breathe around it, cannot get air into lungs that refuse to inflate. He chokes on it, gasps for air, and then suddenly that knot is gone and his breath comes out as a sob. There is wetness on his cheeks. He bows his head, allows Peter to fuck him like this, drive into him hard, harder, and slake his own despair in his body that is as desperate for the contact and the reassurance as Peter is. He still cannot stop the tears that are flowing freely, now that the knot in his chest is gone and everything is falling apart.

Suddenly it's too much. He can't bear it; not like this, in the darkness, unable to see Peter's face. He wants to see him, needs to see him – Peter shivers above him but waits as he pulls away and then turns.

He spreads his legs without shame, wrapping his arms around Peter to pull him closer.

“Like this, Peter,” he says, his voice rough with the tears he feels guilty for even now. It’s not right to burden his own apprentice with his pain. He should be strong for Peter, who was hurt by Lesley’s betrayal the most. He should have prevented it from happening. But he wasn’t able to, and now he cannot stop the tears either. One more failure to add to his tally. “Please.” 

Peter exhales a shaky breath at the plea and brushes his fingertips against Nightingale’s wet cheeks. All Nightingale can do is look up at him, pull him closer with arms and legs and then hide his face against his shoulder as Peter slides back inside him.

It's more awkward this way, but it doesn't matter; they can clutch at each other, can bruise with fingers that need to grasp and hold on tightly and leave marks and aches to reassure themselves that this is real, that Peter still lives, that they have each other even though Lesley is gone.

“Please,” he says again, and Peter silences him with his own mouth. He cups Peter's cheeks in his hands, moans his grief freely into his mouth while his fingers trace and explore that familiar, beloved face. This is why, he thinks brokenly, and then arches and comes in a sudden, shuddering flash of red-hot pleasure that runs up his spine. 

This is why he has never wanted an apprentice: because they look up to you and trust you and smile at you over breakfast and scowl when you give them their Latin homework; and you see their face day after day after day until it's no longer the demons of the past you see in your nightmares but their face falling off instead; you dream of them smiling at you over breakfast and when you see the ruins of their teeth you know that it is too late; you dream of them all alone on top of a tower and you are half an hour away stuck in London traffic; you dream--

And then Peter comes, shaking apart on top of him, silent even now as his face seems a grimace of nearly pain – and then it breaks. Peter gasps for air in great gulps, looks down at him with shocked helplessness as his shoulders begin to tremble, and even before at last the first tears begin to drop onto his chest, he slides his fingers up into Peter's cropped hair again, touches him gently wherever he can. He can't talk; his chest is still too tight with his own tears, even though he can breathe more freely now that the knot is gone. His thumb gently wipes at the tracks of tears on Peter's cheeks, then traces that mouth against which he has spilled his own grief.

Peter, too, is breaking now, but it is not the vision of his nightmares. It's the grief that is breaking free at last, and he can offer nothing to stop it, or to heal the wounds the Faceless Man has left in both of their hearts. All he can offer is the reality of his own body, and in turn cling to the warmth of Peter's skin to remind himself that dreams have no place here. 

Terrible things have happened to him. He thought that after Ettersberg, nightmares could no longer have power over him. But now he has learned fear again, and has found no other way to deal with it but to give in to this desperate need to hold Peter close and feel his heartbeat against his chest.

No. The real problem was never that his body couldn't say no. The truth, he realises as he draws Peter closer, feels the tear-wet face nestle against his throat as Peter shudders with silent sobs, the truth is that his heart doesn't want to say no.

It is a problem. It is a failure. Maybe he was never meant to be master to an apprentice. But all they have left to cling to now is each other.

**Works inspired by this one:**

  * [Shelter [podfic]](https://archiveofourown.org/works/3210311) by [KD reads (KDHeart)](https://archiveofourown.org/users/KDHeart/pseuds/KD%20reads)




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